Life As I Know It

something creatively simple

a sample coffee table book I put together for a gallery . . .

other books in the works - a wedding album, 2005 blog book, project life album, a baby album, and a book of my travel adventures to Guatemala

1. Buried beneath a huge mass 2. defeated completely

Have you ever felt this way?

Overwhelmed.  I do.  I did this afternoon as I walked into my home after taking my kids to the movies for our Spring Break activity.

I walk in and everything that is awaiting my attention springs at me . . .

• the huge piles of laundry that I still need to do - I did a ton yesterday but I am still not finished
• the sticky note reminding me I need to pickup toothpaste and bars and weedeater line
• several sessions that are in various stages of editing that need to be wrapped up and posted
• a card order that was printed and messed up AGAIN that I need to find a new printer for
• floors that need to be deep-cleaned
• running shoes reminding me I need to put in my miles today
• stuff that needs to be picked up and put away
• a quilt that needs to be finished
• dust that needs to be wiped away

and I can go on and on.  And did I mention it is spring break?  I need to keep my kids busy, having fun, and not lamenting "I'm bored! What can we do now?  Where can we go?" 

I'd like to think I multi-task like the best of them.  However, it seems I sometimes come up short, and many things are started but so many things are needing to be completed.  Does this not sound familiar to anyone?

I feel compelled to be like this . . .

However, I often find that although I have my hands in many things, I feel like I am getting less done. 

Getting less done frustrates me, especially when there is so much to do!

The other day, when I was finding myself counting to 10, trying not to expel screams of frustration, I received an e-mail from Aby Garvey of SImplify 101 that included a solution to my recurring problem which  I want to share with you.

First, I am going to preface it with an excerpt from a movie.  In the scene in the movie, a youth minister is sharing with her kids that it is very hard to see things when you are close to them.  Isn't it hard to see a light at the end of the tunnel "TO-DO" when your view is blocked?  Sometimes I think we just need to kind of go off somewhere and take a "time-out",  Step out of the mess or situation and regroup.

By stepping away from things, we have the opportunity to think and re-focus and get back on track which is the purpose of the exercise Aby shared in the e-mail.

She told us to write on a piece of paper "I will get more done if I focus on one thing at a time."  Below this reminder - which should be written BIG across the top, we make a list of all the items that are vying for our attention right now.  And then you ask yourself "What is the one most important thing for me to work on right now?"  You select the task and then you focus all your energy on getting that one task done.  Completely.  Not half-done so you can start something else.  ALL THE WAY DONE.  And then you can move onto the next thing.  And keep moving forward ONE task at a time. 

I started working on this this afternoon, and you know something crazy?  It actually works.  You see PROGRESS.  You get the satisfaction of putting slashes through those things on your list of to-dos instead of standing in a circle of things that are only half-done.

So next time you feel buried or defeated or overwhelmed, go take a time-out.

I am glad I did.

a peek at a couple of things I have been working on.

I am currently working on a lot of stuff. stress lot.

One of the recent projects which I completed was a series of 4 embroidery squares which are going to be incorporated into a big quilt that will be given as a gift to my sister when she has her baby.  Squares were sent out to every family member.  Because there are 4 girls in my family, I received four.  Confession, I don't embroider regularly and haven't really done anything like that beyond putting a few running stitches in a scrapbook page.  I am a quick learner though and so I found a bunch of videos which demonstrated how to do a variety of different types of stitches.

And then I set myself to work.  It took me quite awhile because I like details, but I got them done.

(click to see larger)

I am also working on several photography session events, including these which I just barely have taken a peek at.  These are from a wedding I shot down in Guatemala in February.

 

 

I have a ton of other things I am working on including some Easter decor, a quilt, a blog book, a Project Life album, and a baby album for my new nephew (it will be filled with hybrid pages - a combination of paper and digital elements).  I anticipate showing you some of those things soon and posting about some adventures I had here . . .

ttyl~

12 on 12 going once, 12 on 12 going twice, 12 on 12 going thrice.

As I mentioned to a friend last night, I am way way behind on blogging.  However, I am not going to stress about it and I am just going to keep plugging along and write a post here and there when I can squeeze in a little time to do so. 

I took a little time this morning to update my Project Life aka Project 365 blog and I am happy to report that I am caught up and all up to date.  I am in the process of getting the pictures printed and still assembling my album so hopefully during Spring Break (since we don't have to BE anywhere) I will get a chance to get that caught up too and show you a few pages.

Another thing that I have been doing in conjunction with Project Life is to also do 12 on 12 which is on the 12th of each month of the year,  I take 12 pictures throughout the whole day to document just what was going on during the whole day.

Being way behind on the blog, I only managed to post about January thus far . . .

Life has been quite interesting these past few months with navigating all the family busy-ness.  Just how interesting? Well, I could write a novel but for now how about I give you some snapshots of a few days of life at the Jenkins' Zoo.

And so I give you February 12 on 12 - the theme for this day would have to be "Getting There is Half the Battle"

.01 Early morning wake-up call. The twins had to get up extra early this morning to get to the school by 7am for preparations for the dance competition that they were performing in later that day

.02 Put on your dancing shoes. Practice and practice and more practice.  The girls went over their routines several times that morning and on several days and for several hours before that day.

.03 Running loads and loads. of laundry.  With Ryan and I getting ready to leave for 10 days, I needed to make sure all the laundry was complete and that we had everything we needed to pack for the trip, the kids had enough clean clothes for while we were gone, and all uniforms for dance and soccer were clean.

.04 Packing. is such a daunting case.  Especially when you are going to spend 10 days roaming around a third world country and going to shoot a wedding there.

.05 Soccer game. Had to run Zack out to the field for a mid-day game.  Ryan had a work event that Saturday so I was kid-taxi on my own to all the various activities.

.06 Like omg. The girls performing a number to "OMG" a song from the Broadway musical "Legally Blonde"

.07 Dance appreciation.  The twins enjoying the other dance team numbers as they sit in the stands.

.08 Trophies.  The girls won 3 trophies for their performances in the competition.

.09 Airport race.  We raced from the competition home, grabbed our suitcases, and raced to the airport to get checked in on time for our red-eye flight to Fort Lauderdale

.10 Rather be in a golf cart?  The seating on the plane was beyond ridiculously cramped.  Our seats were so close to the ones in front of us that I had to push my knees up to comfortably fit.  The back of the seats in front of us had an advertisement for a golf vacation that read "Rather Be Sitting In a Golf Cart?" Umm. like heck yeah.  My legs went numb during the 5 1/2 hour flight.

.11 Bad Spirits. They should really change the name of the airline.  While the flights our cheaper, it doesn't make up for the discomfort of travel. 

.12 Almost there.  Customs at the Guatemala airport.  We had made it 2200 miles to our desitination. 

 

March 12 on 12

(other image credits: Alarm clock - Cuba collection, Vdara bed - Vdara advertisement, Vintage dancers - Library of Congress archives)

.01 Fountain show.  Ryan and I were staying at the Vdara at City Center for our anniversary.  The Bellagio fountains were visible from our 38th floor window.  You could hear the fountain show go off ever so often until the wee hours of the morning.

.02 Alarm clock possessed.  Something was clearly wrong with our alarm clock.  It started going off every hour starting at 2 am.  I had turned it off and yet it would go off.  The cord was behind a paneled wall so we could not yank it out of the wall.  I tried messing with the volume and it still would go off.  It made for a sleepless night.

.03 Stay in  bed.  Finally at 7am, Ryan could not take the alarm clock anymore and yanked the cord somehow out of the wall.  We went back to sleep and slept until 15 minutes before check out time

.04 Montesano mussels.  Since we slept in, we were starving when we left the hotel so we decided to try Montesano's, a place that several of our friends have mentioned as being good.  I am not one to go out to eat for Italian food because I have yet to find a good Italian restaurant.  My mussels were delicious.  Ryan had the chicken parmigiana.  He told me mine was much better.

.05 Target run.  We had a wedding reception to attend later that afternoon and so I stopped into Target to get a few household items and a gift card.

.06 Nap.  With a sleepless night, Ryan and I were both exhausted.  And so we crashed for an hour nap before we needed to get ready to go to the wedding reception.

.07 Stila concealer.  Is the best concealer on the market.  It works miracles.  It covered my humongous dark circles well.

.08 Hayley got married.  Hayley has been a friend of our family for quite some time.

.09 Wedding cake.  My SIL Jen had made the wedding cake. We enjoyed the cake and seeing old family friends at the reception.

.10 Frozen custard.  Since we had been gone all day, Ryan and I took the kids out for a family night to Nielsen's Frozen custard.  The whole family opted for concretes.

.11 Youth dance. Madison went to the youth dance with a few friends.

.12 Early to bed.  After dropping Madison and her friends off at the dance, I came home and the rest of the family crashed for an early bedtime.

 

April 12 on 12

  

(other image credits: Junior Achievement - website, Rocha family - family fb album)

.01 Twin eggs.  Today started early with a little midnight baking.  While cracking the eggs, we discovered "twin yolks".

.02 Crazy Hair.  The theme for Nevada Reading Week is "Reading Rocks".  Today the kids were told that they could dress up their hair with a crazy hairstyle or hat.  Zack spiked out his hair will colored spiker paste like a punk rocker.

.03 Almond milk.  I quit drinking regular milk because I really don't like milk and sometimes it makes me a little queasy.  So almond milk and granola has become my regular breakfast.

.04 Jr. Achievement.  Today Ryan participated in the Junior Achievement program and taught classes all day at Elaine Wynn Elementary School.

.05 Brazo Gitano.  Zack had to make a cultural dish for his World Traveler report.  Zack's country was Spain and so we made a custard-filled sponge cake called Brazo Gitano which means "arm of the gypsy".

.06 Report.  Went to the school to watch Zack give his Powerpoint presentation on Spain.  He asked his teacher if he could walk me to my car.  I think he just wanted to polish off the rest of the dessert.

.07 Dental visit.  Sydney was having some issues with puffy gums so the orthodontist took off some hardware and sent her to the dentist to have a cleaning done.

.08 Fish Taco Tuesday.  Rubio's has the most amazing fish tacos for cheap after 2:30 on Tuesdays.  For $1.25, how could you go wrong?  Syd and I each had one after the dentist for an afternoon snack.

.09 Dinner fail.  I made Italian sausage and pepperoni subs with tomato and pesto sauce.  Ryan thought they were just OK.  The kids wouldn't eat theirs at all.

.10 Surprise visit.  Some old friends were in town and dropped by for a surprise visit.  I used to watch their little girls back when I tended kids.  The girls have grown up so much!

.11 Exhaustion.  It had been a long day and sometimes before bed all you want to do is unwind and lay on the couch.  This is where I found 3 out of the 4 kids a half hour before bedtime.

.12 Early to bed.  I went to bed way early.  As I was sitting on the couch, talking with my family I totally fell asleep.  I was in bed by 8:24.

 

 

doing the truffle shuffle?

OK.  Maybe not.  That would be tremendously frighteningly scary.

So how about an Ipod shuffle?

Before I get to that, just want to say thanks to the handful of you who still stop by and read every now and then. 

I am just in the really extremely busy season of my life.  This past week has been kind of crazy chaotic with unexpected things, clients, kids having a ton of stuff on the calendar, and extended family stuff - the day before yesterday we sent my in-laws off on an 18 month mission, and I am currently in California to throw my sister a baby shower and take some pictures, and then I will be flying home Sunday morning to do a session Sunday afternoon.  Monday begins another round of craziness.  

I could not work through the craziness that is my life without music.  I clean to music. I work out to music.  I create to music.  I edit to music.  Music also gets me through a lot of ups and downs in my life.  It gets me through those moments when I am so exhausted I can barely keep my eyes open.  It uplifts me.  It gets me through sad moments.  It inspires me.

Most often, you will find me on Pandora.  My current 2 favorite stations are Matt& Kim and Vampire Weekend.  Awesome stuff there.

Anyhow, back to the ipod shuffle thing.  So I was blog hopping and a couple blogs I ran across had the put your Ipod on shuffle thing and name the first 10 songs that come up.  Since I have music on the brain tonight (just finished watching "Back and Forth" - the Foo Fighters documentary - seriously amazing), I figured why not give it a go.  So with a random shuffle of 6,091 songs, this is what came up . . .

1. "Instant Messenger" - Muse (seriously one of my favorite bands of all time)

2. "Compulsion" - Martin Gore 

3."Every Day is Exactly the Same" - Nine Inch Nails 

4. "Save the Last Dance for Me" - Michael Buble

5. "You Know My Name" - The Beatles

6. "Use Somebody" - Kings of Leon

7. "Layla" - Eric Clapton

8. "Love Will Come Through" - Travis

9. "Not Afraid" - Eminem

10. "10:15 Saturday Night" - The Cure

and for the heck of it, I did it one more time . . .

1. "Last Dance" - The Raveonettes

2. "Please Do Not Let Me Go" - Ryan Adams

3. "King of Anything" - Sara Bareilles

4. "Full of Grace" - Sarah McLachlan

5. "Some Might Say" - Oasis

6. "Dirty Harry" - Gorillaz

7. "Settlin" - Sugarland

8. "Stop and Stare" - One Republic

9. "Come Follow Me" - LDS Church Hymns

10. "Something" - Jim Sturgess - Across the Universe Soundtrack

 

so much always on my mind all the time.

 

There are sometimes I sincerely wish I had an "off switch" to my brain.

I have just spent the last 4 hours in my bed trying to go to sleep.  

(I really should have resorted to some medicinal intervention - tylenol pm or half an ambien or something.  I can't now because I have to be awake in a little over 3 hours to get my daughter off to seminary and then get on with my day)

I tried a few different relaxing techniques, reading for awhile, even some white noise.

However, none of that really works because when it is quiet I have all these thoughts swirling on in my brain.  My brain seems to be very sensitive to any type of stimuli.  And with my brain going like crazy, it is very hard to sleep.

Since I am up and I am not in the right frame of mind to work (I find that my creativity is lacking when I am exhausted), I figured I would lay out what's on my mind here for the heck of it   . . .

• How is it that I can never get everything completely done on my to do list?  Is it that I just put too much on it or is it that I lack focus or is it that I spend more time than is necessary on things?
• I need to set myself apart.  I am in the process of redesigning my client brochure, portrait agreement, product care instructions, client cards, website, etc. etc. because I don't think it sells me as well as it should and I have been copied (this bugs!!).  My clients have told me they chose me because I am very personable and that I and my images that I produce are real, natural.  They also love that I give a lot of variety.  And so I am trying to make sure that what I am doing expresses personal connection, honesty, personality, emotion, uniqueness.  I am also trying to give the people who come to me "seedlings of ideas".  Inception is a powerful thing.  (It's not just an amazing movie.)  If you get a client to think an idea or have a dream, and you fulfill that dream or bring that idea to fruition, you sell more of your work, and you create an experience that they client will return for again and again.
• Soccer is stressing me out.  My kids love soccer.  They live for it.  However, at the moment, they are NOT liking it and sometimes HATING it.  Soccer is a team sport.  If you are playing with a team that does not work well together or in which the other players' skills or work ethic are lacking, it becomes a frustrating experience.  We need to figure out what to do after the spring season is over.
• Many friends work in the teaching profession and at the current moment, budget cuts are leaving some of them without a teaching position for next year.  These friends are very dedicated to their students and to teaching and I find it sad that they must leave when there are so many bad teachers in the school system - those who do not care about their students or who have no clue how to teach
• Parenting my kids as they get older is getting harder.  I find it harder to discipline in such a way that they benefit and learn from the experience.
• My birthday came and went.  All I wanted was one day where I did not have to do anything for anyone else and that I could just concentrate on doing something for myself.  Is that selfish?  It is more than likely it will not happen.  This birthday was kind of a bummer.
• I often feel that I am my own support system.  While it is good to be self-reliant, it would be so nice to be able to or have someone I could ask for help.  Does wanting help make me weak?
• I think I suck at giving advice on boys to my daughter.  She has often asked me "Why do no boys like me?  Why do they only like my friends?" I have told her not to worry about boys and just worry about school and having fun.  I told her to just be herself. She told me that still doesn't answer her questions.  :P  Boy expert I am not.  Boys didn't like me either (back in high school)so I am not sure how to give advice.
• I am kind of in a bummed-out mood at the moment.  I need to listen to some of the Conference talks again.  I need counsel.  I need a source of upliftment.
• Life is so expensive. And yet I need to figure out how to spend less.  It is a conundrum.  How do you spend less when everything in life is costing more?

I know for certain that there were other thoughts that ran through my mind in the last 4 hours but now as I have been writing this, my mind is drawing a blank and I am finally beginning to feel that perhaps I can fall asleep.  Yay me!  Perhaps blogging does have hidden benefits.